Covia Energy LLC and Black Mountain Sand Holdings LLC jointly announced the closing of a definitive agreement to merge in an all-stock transaction. The combined company, which now operates under the name Iron Oak Energy Solutions LLC, is a leading diversified proppant supplier in North America with an active annual production capacity of approximately 30 million tons of sand.
The company’s assets include strategically located in-basin sand mines in the Permian Basin and Eagle Ford Shale, as well as premium Northern White Sand facilities with an extensive logistics network.
Michael Segura, president and chief executive officer of Covia Energy, will serve as the president and chief executive officer of Iron Oak Energy. Scott McNeill, president and chief executive officer of Black Mountain Sand, will join the board of Iron Oak Energy and serve as a strategic advisor.
Key commercial, operational and administrative roles will be filled by management of both companies. Iron Oak Energy will be headquartered in Houston, and will maintain a corporate presence in Fort Worth, Texas.
“This combination creates a leading proppant provider across the most active oil and gas shale basins in North America, and with a debt-free balance sheet, Iron Oak Energy is well positioned to pursue further mergers and acquisitions,” said Segura. “The scale and reach of the combined company are unmatched and allow us to better serve our existing customers’ needs across multiple basins and capture new opportunities. Further, our diversified network of production facilities and significant storage position in the Permian Basin provide the scale, reliability, and deliverability of volumes required to meet the increasing proppant demands of longer-lateral, higher intensity completions.”
McNeill added, “We are excited to enter this new chapter and form Iron Oak Energy in partnership with Covia. As we look forward, we are eager to combine our operations, where our respective employees share a similar culture of safety, customer service, and operational excellence and will have exciting opportunities inside a larger organization. I look forward to working closely with the management team as we enhance the value of our combined businesses and continue to build on the expanded platform this merger creates.”
Iron Oak Energy supplies quality frac sand to the Delaware and Midland Basins with three large-scale facilities in Winkler County, Texas, and one facility in Crane County, Texas. The plants supply multiple products from high-quality reserves in the Permian Basin and have over 16 million tons of annual production capacity and a combined total of over 100,000 tons of storage. The company’s two Eagle Ford facilities, located in Atascosa County, Texas, and Dimmit County, Texas, are leading in-basin plants located in close proximity to prime areas of drilling and completion activity.
Northern White Sand is mined from superior deposits and delivered to multiple oil and gas shale plays. Iron Oak Energy operates a premier Northern White Sand mine, located in Wedron, Ill., with more than seven million tons of annual production capacity and connections to multiple Class 1 railroads.
The company also operates the technologically advanced, highly reliable Northern White facility in Tunnel City, Wisc. Both facilities offer direct access to major producing basins including the Marcellus, Utica, Bakken and DJ Basin. Iron Oak Energy couples these mines with an extensive network of strategically located in-basin terminals which are unit train capable and equipped with storage and high-speed loadout facilities.
Covia Energy was separated from Covia Solutions on July 1, 2024. Covia Solutions, a leading provider of minerals solutions for industrial markets, is not a party to the merger.